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Criterion January Releases (US - DVD R1 | BD RA)

The Criterion Collection announces their release lineup for January...

Criterion has announced their releases for the month of January. Each film will be available on both DVD and Blu-ray, with the same special features. The Eclipse series 31 will only be released on DVD.

Belle de jour

Quote: Release Date: 17 Jan 2012 SRP: $39.95

Synopsis: The porcelain perfection of Catherine Deneuve hides a cracked interior in the actress’s most iconic role: Séverine, a chilly Paris housewife by night, a bordello prostitute by day. This surreal and erotic late-sixties daydream from provocateur for the ages Luis Buñuel is an examination of desire and fetishistic pleasure (its characters’ and its viewers’), as well as a gently absurdist take on contemporary social mores and class divisions. Fantasy and reality commingle in this burst of cinematic transgression, which was one of Buñuel’s biggest hits.

Disc Features -New high-definition digital restoration (with uncompressed monaural soundtrack on the Blu-ray edition) -Audio commentary featuring Michael Wood, author of the BFI Film Classics book Belle de jour -New video piece featuring writer and sexual-politics activist Susie Bright and film scholar Linda Williams -New interview with screenwriter Jean-Claude Carrière -Excerpt from the French television program Cinéma, featuring interviews with Carrière and actress Catherine Deneuve -Original and American release trailers -New and improved English subtitle translation -A booklet featuring an essay by critic Melissa Anderson and a 1970s interview with director Luis Buñuel

Traffic

Quote: Release Date: 17 Jan 2012 SRP: $39.95

Synopsis: Traffic examines the question of drugs as politics, business, and lifestyle. With an innovative, color-coded cinematic treatment distinguishing his interwoven stories, Steven Soderbergh embroils viewers in the lives of a newly appointed drug czar and his family, a West Coast kingpin’s wife, a key informant, and police officers on both sides of the U.S.-Mexico border. The film, delivering a complex and nuanced take on this issue of such great international importance without sacrificing any energy or suspense, is a contemporary classic, and the winner of four Oscars, for best director, best screenplay, best editing, and best supporting actor for Benicio del Toro.

Disc Features -Restored digital transfer, supervised and approved by director Steven Soderbergh and supervising sound editor and rerecording mixer Larry Blake (with 5.1 and 2.0 surround DTS-HD Master Audio soundtracks on the Blu-ray editions) -Three audio commentaries, featuring Soderbergh and writer Stephen Gaghan; producers Laura Bickford, Edward Zwick, and Marshall Herskovitz and consultants Tim Golden and Craig Chretien; and composer Cliff Martinez -Twenty-five deleted scenes, with optional commentary by Soderbergh and Gaghan -Three sets of demonstrations: one on film processing and the look of the Mexico sequences; one on film editing, with commentary by editor Stephen Mirrione; and one on dialogue editing -Additional unused footage of various scenes, from multiple angles -Theatrical trailers and television spots -Gallery of trading cards depicting the U.S. Customs canine squad used to detect narcotics and illegal substances -A booklet featuring an essay by film critic Manohla Dargis

The Moment of Truth

Quote: Release Date: 24 Jan 2012 SRP: $29.95

Synopsis: The Moment of Truth, from director Francesco Rosi is a visceral plunge into the life of a famous torero—played by real-life bullfighting legend Miguel Mateo, known as Miguelin. Charting his rise and fall with a single-minded focus on the bloody business at hand, the film is at once gritty and operatic, placing the viewer right in the thick of the ring’s action, as close to death as possible. Like all of the great Italian truth seeker’s films, this is a not just an electrifying drama but also a profound and moving inquiry into a violent world—and perhaps the greatest bullfighting movie ever made.

Godzilla

Quote: Release Date: 24 Jan 2012 SRP: $39.95

Synopsis: Godzilla is the roaring granddaddy of all monster movies. It’s also a remarkably humane and melancholy drama made in Japan at a time when the country was still reeling from nuclear attack and H-bomb testing. Its rampaging radioactive beast, the poignant embodiment of an entire population’s fears, became a beloved international icon of destruction, spawning more than twenty sequels. This first thrilling, tactile spectacle continues to be a cult phenomenon; here, we present the original, 1954 Japanese version, along with Godzilla, King of the Monsters, the 1956 American reworking starring Raymond Burr.

Eclipse Series 31: Three Popular Films by Jean-Pierre Gorin

Quote: Release Date: 29 Nov 2011 SRP: $44.95

Synopsis: Filmmaker Jean-Pierre Gorin, widely known for his early-seventies collaborations (including Tout va bien) with Jean-Luc Godard in the Dziga Vertov Group, established his singular voice with this trio of accomplished, fascinating, and nontraditional documentaries, made in Southern California after his relocation there. Poto and Cabengo (1978) is a compelling visit with two young San Diego twins who have invented their own language. In Routine Pleasures (1986), Gorin conjoins the story of a group of model train enthusiasts in Del Mar with a meditation on the work of critic and painter Manny Farber. And My Crasy Life (1992) is an expectation-shredding exploration of a Samoan gang in Long Beach. With these three films, Gorin excavates hidden communities that are a part of everyday American life, and shows himself to be a major chronicler of what is eccentric and beautiful in our common culture..